Police under pressure over bail confusion, says Labour

The judgment on police bail in May overturned 25 years of police practice, meaning officers can no longer bail suspects for more than four days without either charging or releasing them.

Shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said yesterday: “It’s causing huge pressures for the police who are now having to review and reassess huge numbers of cases.

“We think there are likely to be over 1,000 domestic violence suspects alone currently out on police bail. Those bail conditions maybe not to go to their ex-wife’s work place for or not to go back to the victim’s home – the police are now worried about whether or not they can enforce them.”

Three Supreme Court judges will today consider an application to stay the decision, which could put the ruling on hold until the full appeal is heard at the same court on July 25.

The Government has already announced emergency legislation to deal with the problem, with MPs pledging cross-party support.

The row started when district judge Jonathan Finestein, sitting at Salford Magistrates’ Court, refused a routine application from Greater Manchester Police for a warrant of further detention of murder suspect Paul Hookway on April 5.

High Court judge Mr Justice McCombe confirmed the ruling in a judicial review on May 19, which meant time spent on police bail counted towards the maximum 96-hour limit of pre-charge detention, after which Home Office officials were told about the problems.

Ms Cooper attacked the Home Office’s reaction when Policing Minister Nick Herbert made an emergency statement to the Commons last week.

Speaking on Sky News’ Murnaghan programme yesterday, she said ministers had weeks to deal with the ruling. They should have done emergency legislation a week or two ago,” said Ms Cooper.

“This judgment itself came out six weeks ago, it’s been in effect for the last two weeks.”

She challenged Home Secretary Theresa May to unveil plans for new laws today, adding: “We’ve hardly heard a peep from the Home Secretary on this. It’s a really serious issue.”

Ms Cooper also called for an inquiry into why it took so long for the issue become public.

Defending the timetable last week, Mr Herbert told MPs: “Only when we received the written judgment on June 17 were we able to begin to ascertain the extent of the effect, when it did begin to become clear that the extent of the judgments and its implications would go beyond simply the issue of warrants of further arrest.

“Since that period the Home Office, Crown Prosecution Service and Acpo (Association of Chief Police Officers) officials have been in a constant dialogue to try and understand the detailed implications of the decision, which are complex.”